Liberia's striking medics face sack

Liberia's striking medics face sack

Tuesday, October 14, 2014 2:44 pm


The Liberian government on Tuesday threatened to sack doctors and nurses who are on strike demanding danger money to care for Ebola patients in the country worst hit by the epidemic.

“”Those who stay home in respect of the order given by the health workers union will be replaced and will never come back to work,” Health Minister Walter Gwenigale said on state radio.

Ebola workers in Monrovia: sack threat for strikers

Ebola workers in Monrovia: sack threat for strikers

The labour action began last week with a go-slow at Monrovia’s Island Clinic, whose Ebola treatment unit (ETU) has been overwhelmed since it opened on September 21 with support from the UN World Health Organization (WHO).

The strike then expanded to other ETUs on Monday and again Tuesday, though reliable figures on the stayaway rate were unavailable.

The local office of the WHO said one-third of Island Clinic staff were not at work.

“WHO is very concerned for the safety and well-being of the Ebola patients, and urges the health workers to continue with their work,” the office said in an email.

“”One of the possible consequences of the strike is that there can be less health workers working at the ETUs. This means that there is more pressure on the ones that are working to take care of the Ebola patients. Therefore, risks for making mistakes are higher, which is a concern to us.”

A health worker in the central city of Gbarnga told AFP all his colleagues were on strike.

The head of the health workers union, Joseph Tamba, meanwhile said he and the union’s secretary general George Williams were in hiding from the authorities.

Tamba said the strike was aimed at obtaining permanent contracts for some 6,000 employees and charged that the government had reneged on money promised at the start of the crisis.

Ninety-five Liberian health workers have died so far in the epidemic, and their surviving colleagues want pay commensurate with the acute risk of dealing with Ebola, which spreads through contact with bodily fluids and for which there is no vaccine or widely available treatment.

The epidemic — which the WHO has called “the most severe acute public health emergency in modern times” — has killed more than 4,000 people this year, mostly in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.


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